Tax Reform



At the time of last year’s budget, I wrote a blog post[1] revealing how neither the Government’s nor the Labor Party’s then proposed tax changes… Read More ›

More Carefully Designed, a Stage Three Tax Measure Could Be a Responsible and Genuine Reform

In addition to the preference available to owner-occupiers in the form of the main residence exemption, the Australian tax system offers preferential income tax treatment… Read More ›

The Income Tax Treatment of Housing Assets – Assessing Proposed Reform Arrangements

Was the 2019 election a referendum on taxing capital and labour? And if so: where next for tax reform? Labor’s package of tax changes would… Read More ›

Tax Policy Is Doing Too Little to Help the Squeezed Middle

In the field of tax, hard truths are playing out in this year’s election. The first is that special concessions that privilege older, wealthier voters… Read More ›

The Newest Election Faultline Isn’t Left Versus Right, It’s Young Versus Old – and It’s Hardening

Politicians often invoke the word “reform” to convey the significance, or gravitas, of a particular policy change they are proposing. However, the tax policies implemented… Read More ›

What Will the Coalition Be Remembered for on Tax? Tinkering, Blunders and Lost Opportunities

There were no new tax ideas in the 2019 Budget, which I guess is to be expected from a six-year-old government ready to pull the… Read More ›

[Budget Forum 2019] A Simpler Tax System Should Spark Joy—Eliminating Tax Brackets Sadly Doesn’t

“If we have always considered the revenues as the sinews of the commonwealth…” (si vectigalia nervos esse rei publicae semper duximus…) (Cic. Manil. 17). It… Read More ›

Politics of Taxation in the Roman Empire

On Friday morning last week I put on the TV in Queensland to catch the final stages of the Sydney to Hobart yacht race on commercial television,… Read More ›

Australia, as Designed in the 1890s, Is Past Its Use-By Date

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